


La Grasse Matinée

by caitfair24



Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: Angst, F/M, Romance
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-05-08
Updated: 2019-05-08
Packaged: 2020-02-28 14:08:25
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,356
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18757984
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/caitfair24/pseuds/caitfair24
Summary: My submission for @cametobuyplums‘s 2000 Followers Celebration Challenge on Tumblr. My prompt was: "Faire la grasse matinée: to sleep in [literal: to make the fat morning]"





	La Grasse Matinée

The taste of anger tangles strangely with the first coffee of the morning, and for a moment, you find yourself staring down into the mug as though expecting to find a neat translation for the bitterness floating somewhere near the surface. You take another sip; no, it’s certainly last night, still stuck somewhere between your teeth. 

A glare across the kitchen -- and the space seems to be constricting with the force of shared emotion. Buttressed by long hours of side-by-side solitude, stiff as boards in your bed, the duvet bunched oddly between your two bodies. 

When once a Friday night dipped in wine and moonlight would have led to hours awake, sheets pushed to the floor and those furtive two o’clock kisses you adored so much -- now Saturday, a rude one, has pushed its way into being. No luxuriated lie-in today; you’re both up ridiculously early.

He slams down his mug. 

“Jesus,” you mutter. “I get that you’re pissed at me, but is it really necessary to --” 

“Don’t start this again.” Bucky initiates the usual morning routine -- but this time, the ordinarily quiet, loving tasks are usurped by raw tension that snaps and spits back at you. Everything from the crack of two eggs in the pan (just two; none for you) to the absence of music -- ordinarily, on a Saturday, he would play _something_ , anything. Usually reflective of his mood: jazz, when he was feeling dreamy; soul, when he was loving; rock, when he was...well... _energized_. 

Each thunderclap of silence seems to strike you a little deeper, but hunger creeps in regardless of your mutual misery. You bump his elbow as you reach for a box of cereal; he grunts and moves away.

There’s no cruelty in either of you. No fists or slaps or words that cut too deep. It’s a surface kind of rage, boiling water on tarmac -- nothing ancient and angry underneath. But where, before, you’ve always been able to swat it all away, last night you went to sleep with it. The question sizzling on your tongue; his answer sour and selfish, pressing against the seam of his lips. 

He drinks his coffee; flips his eggs. When the smell of burnt toast rises in the kitchen, you look over to realize he’s only done two slices. None for you. 

Hurt squeezes your stomach, so tight and so bitterly that you push away the cereal, let it grow soggy in the bowl. 

You watch as Bucky moves around the stove, muscles rippling and tautening under the expanse of a loose grey t-shirt. One you’d bought for him. 

That he’d worn a shirt to bed hurt you more than anything else had this morning. 

How many times in the night had you craved his skin? The soft, minty scent of him against you? One finger, trailing over the divide of untouched blankets, you think -- and you could have stroked along the length of his jaw, let him nuzzle into the widened cup of your hand. Or his arm, the metal one. You loved the cool press of that against you; the elegance of the limb; the way he had reclaimed himself with it. Because of it. In spite of it. 

He uses that arm now to reach for the pepper mill, and with a silvery shake, he’s done. You know his morning movements, regimented as a soldiers’ mess: eggs and toast and pepper to finish. He’s made you the same meal every Saturday morning for the past four years, and though it’s plain and you’d rather have a bagel, a croissant -- something flaky and warm and buttery -- you’ve always eaten it with relish. 

Because he made it for you. Because before he crawled into your bed for the first time, before he mapped the story of your skin with his lips and hands, before you’d realized how much better a low, husky “ _Doll_ ,” sounded at three o’clock in the morning -- before all of that, he’d made you eggs. Eggs and toast and pepper. 

Spartan fare, but he was proud. 

But this morning, he eats at the island. Leaning over, flipping through his phone. You know he’s checking the news; he always scans the headlines. Then email. Then messages. Then you. It’s always you, after the morning debriefing. 

_How did you sleep? How are the eggs? Hot enough? Did you get enough butter? Coffee’s good, doll; I don’t know how you make it so goddamn good_. 

There’s poetry, isn’t there, in having the same conversation every Saturday for four years and _never_ , _ever_  growing tired of it? 

The urge to bait him rises up again as he pointedly ignores you. One word, and you could start it up again. Bring him back. But -- and this thought lets loose a little tang of nausea, snaking through your veins at the realization -- what if you _deserve_  this? 

Watching as he shovels the second egg in whole, you replay the conversation from the night before. 

* * *

Nestled carefully on the couch, wine in hand, he’d scrolled through Netflix idly, looking for inspiration. You were no help; you simply said “sure” to everything. “No,” he said abruptly, dropping the remote into your lap. But your legs were tilted to tuck against his, and the remote simply slid to the floor. 

The clatter made him stir. Jerked against you a little. Just slightly, just enough that you’d shifted forward, masking the response quickly with a deft little scoop of your hands, retrieving the remote and placing it back safely on his lap. “You should pick something,” he said firmly. 

But you’d just shrugged. There were options, certainly, but you couldn't choose. Too many. Too many facets of yourself to explore with him sitting next to you. Did you want him to see you cry, really, earnestly cry? Or should you laugh? Hide your face behind your fingers, grip him tightly, brace your feet safely against the edge of the couch, lest there be monsters underneath? 

For a couple of four years, these are not usual considerations. For a couple such as you, they are necessary precautions. 

Stories emerge in disjointed chapters. He shows you his best when you show him your worst, and vice versa. It’s a tango of revelation, and has been for years. In quiet moments, in sweet moments. Around other people, or completely alone. Washing dishes, doing laundry, going for a walk, or having sex -- all moments, all contexts facilitate what you’ve come to recognize as the reading. The exploration of him. And you. And the two of you together. 

Now and then, a moment such as that occurs. When he pushes against what you’ve become for him, even in the smallest enacting of that particular chapter. It’s when you play the biddable partner, the woman who bows to his wishes, his wants. 

Sometimes he adores it, because you do it so innocently. Flavours of ice-cream, movies to watch, restaurants to eat at or galleries to visit. “I’m flexible,” you say, without a trace of innuendo. 

There’s nothing subservient about it; merely accommodating. And it spoils him, makes him feel that he’s worth someone having to be flexible for. 

There are more times when he does the same. Denies himself what he wants to make you happy, to earn that smile, to buy that laugh. He trades in small sacrifices, offerings to the altar of your own contentment. But he does this daily, regularly. Sometimes gratingly. So that you feel indebted to him, constantly, for your own snatches of happiness. 

Matters come to a head now and then. Erupt into thinly-veiled accusations. Skirting around the issue. Speaking in a language which denies the honest definition of what you’ve done to each other: you’ve loved a little too much, a little too hard, just for a second. 

Because that’s possible. Two weeks without Chinese, for you, because it doesn’t sit right with him. A month with no television, for him (an actual goddamn sacrifice, thank you very much), because you can’t decide what to watch on movie nights and --

What’s upsetting is not, of course, those actual “losses.” It’s the rise of them that irks you, the crescendo of “No, that’s fine” and “You go ahead, you choose, baby.” 

It aches at you both, the little sacrifices. The lack of communication. But neither of you is willing to take that step forward, the plain articulation of “I want this, do you want that?”

They build and build until they change, altered around the jagged edges. Instead of his cute refusal to choose a place for dinner, you’d watched with sullen resignation as he heated up a bowl of tomato soup last night, the tempting scent of your chow-mein doing absolutely nothing to convince him. Prickling in your stomach, you wondered about people whose partners choked down what they didn’t like, just so they could have a meal together. 

You’d shaken your head. Twirled another bean sprout between the tines of your fork. 

Then had come the movie, the show. Flicking through the options, finding nothing. And then the remote. 

And the words neither of you should’ve said. 

But worse -- neither of you should’ve gone to bed on them. 

* * *

Curled like a comma into your own nerves, last night had seen you wide awake for hours, studying his breathing patterns until your sleepy, overwrought mind could no longer distinguish between a waking pace, a sleeping one, or -- the most likely -- a feigned one. 

Why had this fight felt different? You’d argued before, after all. Many times -- in fact, you were rather good at it. Witty back and forth, cutting sarcasm, a little lit flirting peppered throughout to ensure you both understood there would be a _coming back from this_. Maybe some sulking. A little pout. 

And then an olive branch. Always an olive branch. 

This fight, though, had been born in the simplest of actions. And then quickly blossomed and burst into a maelstrom. 

Horrible, petty things volleyed back and forth across a battlefield of your own design. Things you couldn’t unsay. Things you had then tucked firmly into bed with you both. 

It amazes you now, scraping the wet bowl of puffed rice into the bin, that he had come to bed at all. You’d had an angry shower, slamming the shampoo bottle around and purposefully leaving his out on the counter, hoping to inconvenience him in the morning, and then had slipped between the sheets and tugged the duvet up high against your chin. 

He’d stood at the dresser, hands braced on either side. Debating, weighing. 

Blue eyes, cold as ice but so, so much warmer, had met yours in the mirror. And you now know, in full retrospect, that _that_  had been your window. 

And you’d just rolled over. 

* * *

The morning limps with a loping gait, tripping over the strangest of hurdles. Showers. Cleaning the kitchen. Getting dressed for a Saturday now void of all plans. 

It’s so _stupid_ , you want to scream. So stupid that you can sort of see how it’s your fault, but know that you’re still frustrated with him. So stupid that you cried for twenty minutes in the bathroom over the lack of eggs and that damn soggy cereal.

So stupid that you _want_ him, just want him. Even though he said...he said...

You meet again at noon, having found small tasks and to-dos to keep you separate. But neither of you, you realize with a jolt, has gone back into the bedroom. 

_That’s_  where it needs to happen. 

* * *

You confront Bucky in the hallway, square up to his chest. When he snaps back, your eyes swim; despite your best efforts to maintain some sense of composure, they overflow. 

Why is there such _meanness_  at the heart of the two of you? The remarkable thing is, nothing he says, nothing you say -- none of it is truly horrible. Not really. Surface wounds, that’s all. Splinters so shallow you can see the full length of them through the first, thin layer of skin. 

You’re sore, both of you. And tired. And wanting. But it’s the tears that break you both. When he can’t deny you’re upset; when you can’t deny you’ve upset him. 

Peace talks occur right there on the floor. Your right foot pressed against the door to the linen closet; his arm wrapped around you. A purging in five minutes. _I’m sorrys_ so soft you could almost cry afresh. 

But you don’t. 

Because even though you’re dressed, even though your makeup might stain the pillowcase or the white duvet -- even though he didn’t make you eggs and you didn’t make his coffee, and he slammed his favourite mug, the one you bought him as a joke so long ago -- despite all of that, he tugs you into the bedroom. 

When Bucky undresses you, there is no lightning. No fire. No heat racing up your spine, engulfing your skin in a pink blush. There’s just his fingers, rough but appreciative against lace underneath, managing to slide down the jeans until they pool neatly on the floor. 

He takes out your hair and you play with his, watching it glide against his shoulders. You take off the grey t-shirt, and savour the planes of him again. 

“Let’s reset,” he says, and his voice is raspy with want. But not for skin, not for heat, not for the hotter press of two souls in one bed. 

No, he wants to reset the day, and so do you. 

He slips in beside you, tucking his feet a little over onto your side, flinging open one arm in an invitation. 

It’s a melding, isn’t it? The way you curve against him, fit so perfectly it’s as though you two were carved for each other. He brushes your hair away from his face, nuzzles into your temple. You tip your head back for a chaste kiss, because that’s all you need right now from him. 

A little reset. A Saturday as it should be. Soaked in sleep and warm dreams of coffee and eggs. “Come on, doll,” Bucky says, voice drowsy now. Heavy. Syllables colliding in the aftermath of absolution. “Let’s just sleep in.” 


End file.
